Seminarian Cinnamon Rolls

Recipe compliments of Chef Jon, the Seminarian

For one pan (regular size cookie sheet) of app. 1 dozen rolls.

In mixer bowl, mix together:

2 cups warm water

1 Tbs dry yeast

1 Tbs sugar

1 Tsp salt

* Gradually add app 4 1/2 additional cups of flour

 into mixer with dough hook attached.

* Mix until it starts to come together, then add about

1/4 cup oil (any oil not too heavy tasting).

* Roll dough flat, but not too thin. Should be about 12"x12" square.

* Soften (nice and soft, but not melted) a whole stick of butter and spread it evenly over the dough.
* Sprinkly generously with cinnamon/sugar (mixed 3:1)

* Roll up.  Take a piece of ordinary string, loop it under the dough, about 1" from the end; twist over the top and pull, to cut the dough cleanly.

* Repeat until 12 rolls are cut. (Can be more, depending on size of rolls).

* Grease pan, and place rolls fairly close together.  Cover and set on stove to rise while oven preheats to 325.

* Once risen, bake for approximately 20 minutes, until lightly browned.

* DO NOT overcook.

Frosting

1 stick butter -- room temperature (optional)

8 oz package cream cheese -- room temperature

2 - 3 cups powdered sugar

1 teaspoon of vanilla, almond, or orange extract

* Using mixer (or beating vigorously with fork), mix the butter and cream cheese together (or just the cream cheeese alone), about 3 minutes on medium speed until nice and smooth.

* Add the extract and mix. Slowly add the powdered sugar. Keep adding until you get to the sweetness and thickness you like.

* Spread on cinnamon rolls with a blunt knife or spatula.

Enjoy!

And, let me tell you, folks -- not because I'm his mom and I have a sweet tooth,  though I certainly do -- but, seriously, these cinnamon rolls are ambrosia!



The List + Butter Making 101

* turkey: check
 (Two fourteen pounders instead of one 20-odd pounder, because the price worked out better, and because, even though we have a light crew this year, we LOVE us some leftover turkey!)

* potatoes:  check
 (Russet, ten pound bag.)

* green beans:  check

 (To be made Grandmom style, with a little butter and a dab of beef bouillon added.)

* creamed corn:  check
(Canned, because it's not wildly popular enough to take the time and trouble of "scratch.")

* bread and vegges for stuffing: not quite
(Got bread and onions, but I need to get some more celery.)

* plenty of flour and yeast for rolls: check

* home-churned butter:  check
(The kiddos are really excited about this one; it's a special treat for Thanksgiving this year. See below!)

* Cranberry sauce: check
(Jellied and out of the can because every year I make it from scratch, nobody eats it but me.)

* Sweet potatoes and marshmallows for Fluff: check
(Because some people think Thanksgiving is all about the sweet potato fluff.)

* Spiced apple rings and cream cheese for apple ring treats: not yet
(Can't find the jarred apple rings here on the western slope, so we're making our own today.)

* Pie crusts: check
(Because when you make more than two or three, it's just way too time consuming to roll them all out.)

* Filling ingredients for French silk, pumpkin, apple, butterfinger, and blueberry pies: check

(No more than six this year for goodness sake! We don't have that many people -- and Jon, the pie making machine isn't here... Though he is apparently being utilized by the seminary to supply a Thanksgiving bake sale.)

* All the towels and wascloths washed:  almost
(One more load -- Important because we go through them unbelievably quickly with even only a couple extra teenagers home.)


* Beds and bedding ready for extra bodies:  almost
(Still have to get up in the attic and unpack a couple extra pillows and maybe one blanket)

* Kevin, Michelle, Omar, and Aunt Nina:  On their way!
(Should be here in time for 7:00 Adult Doctrine Class with Fr. Bernard tonight and to help with pies tomorrow!)

Churning Butter 101:



First, add room temperature cream to your butter churn  -- double cream is best .  This is a half gallon, a good amount to start with. We are fortunate to get our cream from the organic dairy up the hill, but grocery store cream will work just fine.  We found the '30s era Dazey butter churn at an antique store some time back, but the same effect can be had using a large jar with a tight lid.  Instead of turning the handle, the cream can be shaken in the jar -- or rolled back and forth by careful hands across a carpeted floor. Or, you can use the blender, but it's not nearly as rewarding as the "hands on" experience!




Now, here comes the fun part!  Start the cranking or shaking or blending at a slow pace until the cream starts to thicken, then pick up the pace.  It took us a about an hour of constant (or well, semi-constant churning) to seperate most of the butter milk from the solid form of the butter.  It takes longer if the milk isn't room temp, or if the "agitation" isn't constant.





If you have a kitty, she will know without being told that something very interesting is going on...





And it won't take long before she is really making life difficult trying to get into the churn.



Once the butter has separated -- and you'll know when it does! -- scoop out as much of it as you can with a ladle.

When you reach the point that the butter looks like this, you will also have a good amount (a couple pints or so) of buttermilk.  After you've ladled as much as you can, carefully pour the last remaining drops of buttermilk carefully into your pitcher and save it all to use later.  Or to drink!

Then, add about a half cup of cold water to the churn/blender/jar and give it some more agitation.  Pour off after a bit and discard.  Repeat this step until the water runs clear.



Here you see the butter and the buttermilk.



The next job is to remove as much of the remaining buttermilk as is humanly possible.  This helps keep your butter from going rancid.  The best way we found to do this is to place the blob of butter on a large, sterilized cutting board.  Using a rubber spatula, pat, turn, and fold the butter.  You'll see "beads" and streams of buttermilk rising up and pooling underneath.  Place a rag at one end of your cutting board and tip the board on the opposite end, to allow the buttermilk to roll down into the rag.  Do this often.  It takes a good half hour usually to pat out all the buttermilk.

 When you've gotten out as much as you can, you can add salt if desired, folding and mixing it in thoroughly with your rubber spatula.  We used three teaspoons for this amount of butter.  But it's up to you how salted you like your butter.



After you've got out as much of the liquid as you possibly can, place the butter into molds -- or little tupperware containters with good lids.  To unmold, you may just need to gently squeeze the sides of your container and pop the butter out onto a plate.  If it sticks, wrap a hot rag around the bottom of the container for just a couple seconds, which should loosen it up enough to upturn onto your butter dish for a pretty presentation.  (You can smooth the final product with the back of a spoon if it's a little "messy.")



This is how much we made from a half gallon of cream.

This is how the finished product looks.  And when you taste it, you'll be amazed at how much better  it is than store-boughten!  SO creamy and light!  Worth every crank!

Eating Like Beavers

Do you read labels?  I have for various reasons most of our married life.  During dieting phases, I have checked: calories, fat, carbohydrates, etc, for instance.  And, though it's always been a trial to my math-challenged brain, I do cost compare items...  But  most the time I haven't bothered much with what ingredients were in the foods because I was too busy trying to figure out whether it was cheaper to buy the lunch meat that was $.09 an ounce or $1.79 a pound, but also because we've always tended toward whole foods. Don't mistake me, though: I'm not a foodie and I'm not very "granola," It's just that back in the day, the simple, naturally healthful foods tended to be cheaper.  Remember that?  Remember when you could go to the farmers' market when organic produce was cheaper than store-bought?  But, I digress...

I just saw a report that a lawsuit against Taco Bell has prompted a USDA investigation of the use of cellulose in prepared foods.  You know what cellulose is?  It's wood pulp.  And it's in everything these days from particle board to sausage to milk shakes to tortillas (Go here for a list).

 The Department of Agriculture, claiming that wood pulp is safe for us to digest, allows for a content of 3.5% in individual food items.  Wood pulp. We're eating wood pulp.   I don't know about you -- but even if I believed in evolution, I don't have any idea that we came from beavers.  At least I didn't.  And I have a hard time believing that Adam and Eve sat around the Garden of Eden gnawing on trees.   In short, it just plain old goes against every instinct for me to believe God intended us to have a little wood pulp in all of our food.   It's a little scary to know that the "powers that be," however, consider it perfectly appropriate for the food industry to use wood as a food filler -- in any amount.  But it's cheap. An easily obtainable by-product, you know.   And they say it's good fiber.  Yeah, I'll say it's good fiber. 

Makes me wonder a little about the increasingly high rate of colon cancer in the world...

Seriously.  Like I don't have enough to worry about with William wanting nothing but jelly sandwiches and popcorn.  Now I have to make sure there's no wood pulp in the jelly?

Sheesh.

The Easter Diet

"Pretty good.  For a pink doughnut."

                                                    

(I'm going to gain so much weight.)

Honeybee Bread on the Feast of St. Benedict

 While we decided we needed to play with this idea a little more before the next time we try it, we weren't dissatisfied with our honeybee bread this afternoon.  Anything eaten drizzled with honey is well worth making, no matter what -- and it really was a fun baking and construction project!

We followed this recipe for sweet bread (ignore the braid and the Easter egg bit included...), rolled it out into a long cylindrical "snake" shape,  then twirled it up up into a spiral, starting with a big circle approximately  ten inches across the bottom, and decreasing in size to a somewhat pointed peak.  Then, we let it rise until doubled (roughly the diameter of a paper plate) and baked it.  It browned a little more than we should have let it, as you can see -- and Cathy and I both wished we'd put an egg glaze on it, plus it kinda tilted to one side when it baked -- but the children were pleased...

Especially with the little goofy-faced bees.

These we imagineered out of just a few things we had on hand already.  The bodies are made out of left-over sugar cookie dough from St. Patrick's Day, the wings are pecan halves, the stripes (which you can't see very well in the pictures, I'm afraid) are made out of thin slices of a tootsie roll, the faces have bits of raisin for the eyes and a bit of craisin for the noses -- and the stingers are made out of  half toothpicks.

Far from perfect, but the kiddos got a big kick out of our little bees -- especially when they lit in the honey we drizzled on a slice of St. Benedict's bread after supper -- and then buzzed (sans stingers!) into their "open hangar" mouths.

Yum!

Happy Feast of St. Benedict, Indeed!

Cheater Paczkis

Certainly not as good as the real thing, but super quick and super easy!

1.  Get a bag of frozen dinner rolls and follow the directions for baking, letting them rise once.

2. Heat your deep fryer to 360 degrees and fry the raised roll dough until golden brown.

3.  For the quickest, easiest, cheatingest version, in lieu of "piping" preserves or custard with a piping bag,

use the tip of the whip cream can to poke a hole in the side of the fried "paczki" and carefully squirt in some spray whipped cream.  (Caution: it can squirt out if it's not centered well, and, well, someone is going to have

 to lick whipped cream off their fingers... or the floor. ;0)

4.  Dust with powdered sugar and eat right away!

  If you wait too long, the whipped cream will deflate!

But, don't worry, this is highly unlikely.

These disappear purty fast!

* My cheaters turned out kinda small because I got busy and let them rise too long -- so they lost their "puff."  They still tasted yummy, though!

* Because there is neither eggs nor milk in the frozen dough recipe and we used light spray whip, this recipe was comparatively lower in fat and calories.  Not diet food, but better than it might have been.  Just sayin....

Happy Pancake Shrove Tuesday!

Heads Up: Great Friday Meal

YA GOTTA TRY THIS SANDWICH!

Really.  This is so good! It includes the most unlikely ingredients -- asparagus and roasted red bell peppers, of all things,  so we were skeptical at first...  But we're really glad we gave it a go, because this meatless meal is a total keeper!  Even the kids loved it. Perfect for Friday, but super delicious any time!  It's on our permanent rotating menu now. :)

* A couple tips: You might want to compare prices between roasted red peppers in a jar and buying fresh red peppers to roast yourself.  The day we went, it was cheaper to buy them jarred.  Most any cheese would work with this sandwich, too, we think.  Some of our gang don't care for Swiss, so we used cheddar instead and it worked great.  Also, when we used the Swiss, we didn't shred it, which saved a step and tasted the same.  Oh! And the simple mayo-mix spread is so easy and goo-ood!  We've filed its easy ingredients away in the back of our minds to try on other sandwiches, too!

Awesome Asparagus Sandwich




Yummy with cracked-pepper and tomato basil
flavored chips and  New Belgium Brewery's
"1554"--  or Root Beer for the younger crowd.

 

Ingredients

1 bunch fresh asparagus, trimmed

1 red bell pepper, seeded and quartered

1 tablespoon olive oil

3 hoagie rolls

6 ounces shredded Swiss cheese

1 ripe tomato, sliced

3 tablespoons mayonnaise

2 tablespoons lemon juice

1 teaspoon minced garlic

Directions

1.  Preheat oven to 350 degrees F (175 degrees C).

2.  Toss asparagus and red pepper with olive oil. Place on a lined baking sheet and bake until tender, about 10 minutes. Once cool enough to handle, remove skin from the pepper and slice into strips.

3.  Cut hoagie rolls in half, place on a baking sheet, and toast lightly in the oven. Remove rolls from the oven and sprinkle each half with cheese. Place 4 to 5 asparagus spears and a few strips of pepper on one side. Place slices of tomato on the other side of the roll. Place the hoagies back in the oven until the cheese is melted, about 5 minutes.

4.  Meanwhile, in a separate bowl, mix the mayonnaise, lemon juice, and garlic together. Spread the dressing on one side of the roll and close sandwich.

* We found this at All-recipes!

Mmmmmmmmmmmm!

If you like asparagus and roasted peppers, you've got to try this!

Just When I Thought We Were Finally Done With All the Christmas Goodies...

I come home from running errands and Cathy has made these:

You know the chocolate oranges you get in your Christmas stocking?
  If you like those, you'll like these.

Double Chocolate Orange Cookies

ingredients

5 oz unsalted butter, softened
2 oz light brown sugar
8 oz all purpose flour
2 oz unsweetened cocoa powder
2 tsp baking powder
2 1/2 oz dark chocolate (chopped or in chips)
Gragted zest of 2 oranges
2 tbsp orange juice

makes
30 cookies

method

Preheat oven to 350.  Line two cookie sheets with baking parchment.

Beat the butter and sugar together in a bowl, until pale and fluffy.  Sift the flour, cocoa, and baking powder together twice and then carefully fold into the butter and sugar mixture.  Add the chopped chocolate, orange zest, and orange juice and gently mix together to form a smooth dough.

On a lightly-floured surface, roll out the dough to a thickness of 1/4 inch.  Cut into approximately 30 cookies with a 2 inch fluted cookie cutter. (Alternatively, "ball" them as you do when making chocolate chip cookies, and flatten to about 1/4 - 1/2 inch thickness) 

Cook in the center of the oven for 12 - 15 minutes.  Allow the cookies to cool on the sheets for 5 minutes before transferring them to a wire rack.  Store in an airtight container.

Enjoy!

(New Year's Resolution?  What New Year's Resolution?)

Because Fried Eggs and Bacon Go So Well With Coffee

(And because a couple people asked)

How To Care For Cast Iron 

I. Before you use your cast iron, make sure it's well seasoned.
   Sometimes -- in fact, most often if you buy your cookware new -- it will come already seasoned.  However, if you inherit it, or if you get it at a thrift store or garage sale (great places to find cast iron!), you'll likely need to give it some "lovin."  Very often people give away their cast iron because they haven't learned how to take care of it themselves.  But (HA!) their loss is our gain.

So, here's what you do. 

1. Preheat your oven to 350 and put a sheet of tin foil (or two), a little bigger than the size of your pan on the middle rack.
2. Using the cheapest oil you can -- don't waste your good olive oil -- coat the bottom of your pot or pan with a thin layer of liquid oil (If you're using Crisco, melt it first).  It should be more than a "spraying" of oil and less than a puddle.
3.  Turn your cookware upside-down over the aluminum foil and let it bake for 1 hour.
4.  After an hour, turn the oven off and let the pan slowly cool inside the oven.  This takes a couple of hours.  Then you're set to cook.

II.  Now that your cast iron is seasoned, there are certain measures it's important to take in order to keep the seasoning.

First, what not to do:

1.  Never, ever wash your cast iron with soap.  I know this is counter-intuitive, but the process of oiling and heating your pans kills any bacteria.  And soap will literally wash off your seasoning and cause your cast iron to rust.
2.  Never soak your cast iron, as this will also wash off your seasoning.
3.  Never take a hot pan and put it directly into water.  Let it cool before washing.

Now what you should do:

To wash
1.  Always scrape your pan well for cleaning, removing all debris from all the sides.  You can use a good metal spatula for this, a spoon, or something like my favorite little scraper gadget, shown here.
2. Wash with plain, lukewarm water.  Scrub with a wire scrub  brush or an abrasive sponge if needed.
3. Then dry thoroughly with a dish towel.  Avoid drip drying.

To cook
1. Either right after washing and drying or right before cooking, give your cookware a good coating of cooking spray or a rub of Crisco or other such grease. 
2.  When beginning to cook, heat your pan slowly, allowing the grease to "settle" in your pan. Avoid bringing your pan to a high heat too quickly.

A well cared-for set of cast iron can be a family heirloom, lasting many many years.  It's easy today, being used to supposedly non-stick pots and pans, to think that we shouldn't have to spend any care on our cookware.  But, seriously, how long has a non-stick pan ever lasted in your house?  Unless you are the most meticulous of cooks (Monk-like) and/or you don't cook much, the non-stick doesn't last more than a couple of years.  In our house, it's even less.  It scrapes and peels off eventually, no matter how much I warn our cooks to use the rubber spatulas.  We've tried many brands over the years, from the least to the most expensive, but we always come back to the old cast iron.

It takes  just  a few seconds more attention to grease the pans, and only a little detour from the norm to remember not to wash with soap.  And it's lovely to use the good, solid, thin-edged metal spatulas with no prick of conscience whatsoever.  We think it's worth the effort.  I expect my children to fight over who gets these pans in the will someday.  Especially the beloved Egg Skillet. (Shown left)

Check it out.  Just the right size for a two or three-egg breakfast.  Over easy, a little salt and pepper.  Side of toast with butter.  And a cup of coffee.

 Perfection.

Anatomy of a Saturday Morning Breakfast

                These are the hens that laid the eggs

Early on a Saturday morning.

This is the girl that gathered the eggs

Early on a Saturday morning.

This is the guy that fried the eggs

Early on a Saturday morning.

 

These are the hands that made the biscuits

Early on a Saturday morning.

This is the boy that snitched the bacon

Early on a Saturday morning.

These are the children that ate the breakfast

Early on a Saturday morning.

Happy faces all around

All on a Saturday morning!